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Messianic Secret

Imagine a secret so important that salvation rests on it. Jesus used this messianic secret and the secret covenant to his advantage, but it has been around for a long time. This is why the Pharisees were adamant Jesus could not be who he said he was. The rules simply did not allow him to show up, and they knew God would not cheat. It turns out there is much more to the story.

The messianic secret and the secret covenant stem from the requirement of separation from the creation account and the context of why mankind was created in the first place. Scripture calls it a curse while someone under this ‘law’ is strictly held to the requirements. The Church today looks at persecution as a historical period, but it is as real today as it has ever been. It is everywhere.

This post begins to uncover layers of this but can only go so deep in this short blog. That said, I’ll try to connect the high-level dots and unveil the secret covenant.

Tearing Down and Building Back

Jesus came to tear down the temple before building it back up. This is the process of lifting the cast-aways out of the depths, like lifting the ox out of the well (Luke 14:5), but also crashing the rulers to the ground. The rules are outlined throughout the law, but I will try to break this down succinctly.

Creation has a series of usurpation events as blessings are crossed. Some examples of crossed blessings, or birthrights, are Perez and Zerah, Jacob and Esau, and Ephraim and Manasseh. We must unwind these crossed blessings to understand how things flow, but the primary point is Jesus found the wreckage left by the rulers. The ruler was Judah, according to Genesis 49:8-12. This is why Judas was pulled into the fray and ‘betrayed’ Jesus. It turns out he is innocent, but the point is everyone had to be dirty because one appeared as not clean. All are made equal in this process, so no man can boast.

The Vow

This process finds Jesus coming from the lowest of the low, which is a Nazarene. The Nazarene is subject to the vow of the Nazarite, according to Numbers 6:1-21. This person has long hair and never consumes anything from the vine. That is the oath or secret covenant taken for a special purpose.

Decoding this means someone must remember the connection to the spiritual world but never say anything about it or connect with the ‘vine.’ The vine is the phone line as the connection, so to speak. Hair grows over time like roots or branches, but they do not intermingle. Eventually, these two plug into each other, but not until it is time. This cross is well described in by Ezekiel (Ezekiel 37:16).

Think of a person in this case as a hub or interconnection for many while blocking that communication for a holy reason. That reason is for growth in a safe place. There is a line that cannot be crossed. This is baptism by fire and Spirit (Matthew 3:16) as each burn in desire (Romans 1:27) for the other through an unnatural dedicated separation (Numbers 6:19) because of an oath made (Numbers 6:2, Leviticus 27:2, Matthew 5:33-36).

Persecution

The early church, it is understood, suffered persecution from outsiders who require secrecy. This was at least partially at the instruction of Gamaliel of the line of Manasseh, Joseph’s son. It is undoubtedly the result of the crossed blessing of his sons by Jacob, Joseph’s father.

Saul of Tarsus persecuted on behalf of Gamaliel, the Messianic Secret and Secret Covenant, until Jesus removed the scales from his eyes on the way to Damascus. To be sure, and oddly, Gamaliel did not necessarily do anything wrong. He followed the rules of division, but there was a better way. If you’ve read my post on speaking in tongues, you know there is meaning hidden in everything. It’s a treasure trove, but Paul lost the scales of judgment on the way to Damascus, which has a capital called Rezin. Comically, that word is pronounced reason. It seems Paul stopped judging on his way to becoming reasonable. He gained the ability to discern.

Division

Think of it this way; if division was required, it could be done in one of two ways. The first is mandating secrecy and enforcing that by prison and death. The second is to use the Word of God like a flaming sword of division to confuse everyone so they do not know the difference. The former brought death. The latter brought ignorance, therefore, salvation.

The need for this secrecy, as mentioned above, is from the creation account. God needs witnesses to be part of creation while allowing the battling sides to ‘state their case,’ so to speak. This provides a pure and true testimony of God’s army. Simply put, the context of creation is living without God’s overt presence. We are to see how we act without a divine temporal connection.

The Appeal

Paul also has an interesting position as he appeals to Caesar, which I affectionately call the Sea Tzar, sea monster, or ruler of the sea creatures who roam the earth like Satan in the book of Job. This is the sea of pirates waiting on the chance to pounce on anyone brave enough to say what they are not allowed to say.

This secrecy goes back to the Tree of Knowledge. One cannot speak. Before Far-I-See’s or Pharisees were brought into proximity (valleys high and mountains low), things were easier to segment. When Jesus came, however, he brought each quadrant into proximity to the living. That required a division in language, or the sides would understand and combine. Jesus managed the unmanageable by dividing the sons of God from the sons of man (broke the bread). He did this through the flaming tongues of hell as the Word of God is used as a weapon. Human pride combined with riddles perpetuates division.

Confusion

Jeremiah 8:8 says we are fools for believing the lying pen of the scribe. Isaiah 6:9-11 says we will not understand, and the Lord made this happen. Jesus taught in parables, which are tongues or riddles. Then Paul said in 1 Corinthians 1:17 the reason was to maintain the potency of the cross.

To think we overcame the power of the scattered languages from the Tower of Babel suggests we are somehow more powerful than God. The funny thing is, nobody realizes it unless they are subject to it. Either you know, or you don’t, which is also biblical according to Isaiah 29:11-12. These two verses suggest something very interesting. The text is locked, it says, while some know there is a lock and some don’t.

Secrecy

Secrecy was commanded from the beginning, but it was also required throughout from Joshua to Revelation as scrolls are sealed, and words are ‘kept’ so one can live on the Word of God and not bread alone. That is the core of the messianic secret and the secret covenant.

Bread, of course, is not bread as we know it. Consider Revelation 2:17 for this. Mannah is the hidden bread. This is spiritual bread, like testimony and promise. The Word is not the word as we know it, but the promise and the ability to wield something powerful at the time of a trial. Love overcomes all of these things. Love is the key to understanding this language, and Paul made that pretty clear. A noisy gong will not be answered. That is because the lesson has been learned. It’s hell. It’s time to open the gates and help our fellow brethren out of that place.

Discipleship counted on this secrecy. The healed person could not say a thing, like the lepers that Jesus healed. Jesus was surprised that only one leper, a foreigner, returned to say thank you. The reason is that person is part of the body of Christ and knows it. Because of the way things work, they must carry the cross in silence, anoint their faces with oil, and pretend everything is fine.

Who?

Understanding who is who requires us to recognize there is more than one kind of person in the world. I’m not going to get into the various kinds, but suffice it to say there are more than one. If not, there is no secrecy. There must be more than that, or the testimony would not matter, but let’s stick with two. One kind lives by faith in Christ and on the word or promise. The other kind lives by grace because that kind of person cannot know all of the details; therefore, they cannot be accountable. For the testimony to be efficacious, silence is required. It is the orderly division among us.

The Release

It’s all about forgiveness. Understanding forgiveness is complicated, especially if it comes from a normal person. Consider how God’s rules allow forgiveness in this post. It is both complicated and simple.

Maybe it is time for the Good Samaritan to find the fallen in the ditch. The Good Samaritan can save when the priests and others walk past the person in the ditch. Keep in mind the rules require those others to walk by (remember Uzzah?), which is why the Samaritan had to be the one to help. The Samaritan is the only lawless person allowed to help so that everyone wins. Mercy prevails, according to the rules.

For more depth, review the other articles about the messianic secret and the secret covenant.